DailyIndia.com, NY
07-10-06
UPI NewsTrack Health and Science News
Global warming threatens European Alps
ZURICH, Switzerland, July 10 (UPI) -- Swiss geologists say the European Alps
could lose 80 percent of their glacier cover by the end of this century if global
warming continues.
The University of Zurich researchers say that would occur if average annual
summer air temperatures rise by 5 degrees Fahrenheit. But, in a worse case
scenario, the scientists say if average temperatures increase by 9 degrees, the
Alps would become nearly ice-free by 2100.
Scientists consider glaciers among the best natural indicators of climate change
and, therefore, monitor them closely. Rapidly shrinking glacial areas are clear
signs of the atmospheric warming observed in the Alps during the last 150 years.
Michael Zemp and colleagues in the university's department of geography said
that by the 1970s, about 5,150 Alpine glaciers covered a total area of 1,123
square miles. That represented a loss of about 35 percent of glacial area from
1850 to that time. Subsequently, they said, there's been a loss of 50 percent of
the 1850 area.
The study is to be detailed in the July 15 issue of the journal Geophysical
Research Letters.
Space station mission has changed
WASHINGTON, July 10 (UPI) -- It's been 22 years since U.S. President Ronald
Reagan proposed building the International Space Station, but its mission has
since radically changed.
Initially the ISS was conceived as a laboratory for developing medicines and
experimenting with a wide variety of substances, The Washington Post reported
Monday.
Today, while only half finished, the station's primary mission has been shifted by
President George W. Bush to support his plan of sending astronauts to the
moon, Mars and beyond.
"As it was originally planned, the space station would be a facility for all users,"
Donald Thomas, NASA's space station program scientist, told the Post. He said
any researcher with an interesting experiment would have been welcomed
aboard the ISS.
Today, said Thomas, the ISS is being used to study such problems as how to
keep kidney stones -- as well as bone and muscle loss -- from developing in
astronauts and why astronauts' immune systems deteriorate while they are in
space.
And experiments planned at the ISS include learning how to control bowling-ballsized satellites that might be used in space missions.
Vaccine developed to fight swine disease
BLACKSBURG, Va., July 10 (UPI) -- U.S. scientists have developed a vaccine
against Post-weaning Multi-systemic Wasting Syndrome, which threatens the
global swine industry.
The researchers in the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary
Medicine at Virginia Tech University say the vaccine has been patented and is
being marketed by Fort Dodge Animal Health Inc.
The vaccine was developed by Dr. X. J. Meng, a physician, professor and
virologist, along with a former graduate student, Martijn Fenaux.
Working in the college's Center for Molecular Medicine and Infectious Diseases
for nearly seven years -- in collaboration colleagues at Iowa State University -Meng and Fenaux developed a vaccine that is expected to substantially reduce
economic losses in the global swine industry.
First identified during the early 1990's, PMWS has been a major problem in
Europe and Asia, producing mortality rates as high as 30 percent and causing
significant disease in up to 50 percent of the animals it infects.
Study: Stem-cell sperm produce offspring
NEWCASTLE, England, July 10 (UPI) -- British and German scientists have
demonstrated sperm grown from embryonic stem cells can be used to produce
offspring.
The experiment was carried out using mice and produced seven babies, six of
which lived to adulthood.
The breakthrough will reportedly help scientists understand more about how
animals produce sperm, with resulting knowledge having potential applications in
the treatment of male infertility.
Newcastle University Professor of Stem Cell Biology Karim Nayernia led the
research while at Georg-August University in Gottingen, Germany, with Professor
Wolfgang Engel and colleagues from Germany and the United Kingdom.
Stem cells have the potential to develop into any tissue type in the body and
could, therefore, be used to develop a wide range of medical therapies.
The study, funded by the University of Gottingen and the Germany Research
Council, is reported in the journal Developmental Cell.